The objective of this research is the development of a research strategy (a) by which parental rearing functions and modes of behaving in the parent role are kept intact but (b) by which experimental control over selected functions or events is also exercised. Mothers and children are observed over a series of half-days, in an informal laboratory (apartment). Conditions allow and encourage daily routines and natural behaviors to take place (eating, playing, resting, disciplining, wathcing TV, etc). There is also an underlying structure in which certain standard events are introduced to bring out given classes of response. Microanalyses and broader interpretive analyses are geared to identifying significant aspects of rearing that become visible in this direct observation of rearing processes. In this project a major focus is on the conceptualization and measurement of rearing. This research paradigm is the basis of a series of investigations on specific aspects of rearing (affective communications and control techniques), Projects MH 02152 and MH 02155, and rearing processes in families selected in terms of criteria of psychological disorders and of normality (MH 02156).